Primary is proud to present Living Form Dying Ground, a new body of work by Miami native Typoe Gran. This exhibition, the artist's second solo with the gallery, opens on Friday, January 31, 2024, at 5 PM.
In Living Form Dying Ground, Typoe Gran maps the dualities of the human experience—growth and decay, legacy and impermanence, discipline and chaos. Through drawings and sculptures, Gran builds grids and patterns that feel orderly yet vibrate with unpredictability.
These spaces hold cycles and rhythms, where joy and fragility breathe together, and mortality is more than a shadow—it's a presence, even a celebration. He asks: What might we leave behind that's better than what we found?
Grounded in Gran's personal history, his work transforms vulnerability into connection. Childhood trauma, moments of solitude, and shared wisdom become threads in a more extensive meditation on life's transience.
Living Form Dying Ground moves beyond Gran's personal narrative, delving into the layered history of cemeteries moonlighting as public parks—spaces where life and death intertwined. These were places where families gathered to grieve and celebrate, play and reflect, and gardens flourished as sites of memory and renewal.
Gran's work seeks equilibrium—balancing ritual and spontaneity, light and dark, creation and decay. His pieces carry the weight of his existence while leaving space for the viewer's reflection and joy. The question lingers: How do we navigate the tension of opposing forces within a single space?
About the Artist:
Typoe Gran (b. 1983, Miami) is a Miami based mixed media artist whose works range from paintings and murals to larger than life sculptural works that can be found in the public realm. His work has been exhibited at Crystal Bridges Museum, Bentonville, Arkansas, Locust Projects, Miami, FL, Public Art of UH System, Houston, TX, Artis-Naples, Naples, FL, and Faena Art Center, Buenos Aires, Argentina and can be found on the permanent collections of the Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh, PA and the Perez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), Miami, FL.
Primary (Est. 2007) is a context and research-driven curatorial collective with a focus on public art. We thrive amongst the self-taught, working-class misfits, who explore the margins of a new Americana through pungent, human-focused narratives. Our work engages with the raw and uncanny, celebrating fringe voices, bootleg culture, and intergenerational commentary while connecting new voices in contemporary art with broader audiences and evolving collections.
